Red Winter
by The Phoenix King
Summary: Hawke's first year in the Free Marches isn't without challenges, but when an army of barbarians rises up from the wilds, Hawke and Bethany face a threat as great as the Blight that consumed their home. With only their dubious comrades in the Red Iron to aid them, the Hawke sisters must stand against the night, or risk annihilation.


_A/N:_ _This is the first entry in a little side project I've been working on recently, partially to establish the Avvar culture in preparation for their presence in **The Grey Path,** and also to dabble a bit into the horror genre. And besides, I've always wanted to do a bit more with Hawke, something beyond the three-act limitations of Dragon Age II, and give her a bit of a moment to shine as an action heroine. As ever, any and all comments, favourites, follows and suggestions are very much appreciated, and I hope you all enjoy!_

* * *

**Red Winter**

**Chapter One – The Warriors of the Gods**

Aelle Bjornfist was afraid.

It was not a sensation he enjoyed, nor was it one he thought could ever plague him. He was a warrior of the Avvars, after all, tempered in battle and loved by the Gods. When he was fifteen, his hunting band had been attacked by a great she-bear of the Palansene Forest; Aelle had slain the beast and returned to the longhouse with its fur thrown over his shoulder as a cloak. At nineteen, he led the Night Wolves against their hated foes, the tribe of the Steel Hands, storming their hold in the arid emptiness of the Vinmark Mountains. Half of score of their warriors had fallen to his axe, and at the height of the battle, Aelle struck down the Steel Hands' chieftain, offering his skull as a tribute to the Mountain-Father and leaving their banner for the hounds to rip apart. When the templars of the lowlanders' jealous god, their _Maker,_ had come into Avvar lands seeking to desecrate their shrines and plunder their altars, Aelle had been amongst the first to heed the Gods' call, reaping a bloody cull of the shining lowlander knights. He had broken shieldwalls, endured the ferocity of the wild places, raided and hunted and bedded and slain. Fear was a weakling's emotion, better suited to women and children and the lowlanders of the Free Marches, not men as mighty as him.

And yet… it was there all the same. It clung to Aelle and the warriors accompanying him like the frost on their spearpoints, and while no man would ever admit it, the fear was there, lurking at the edges of their minds. In the dark of the midwinter night, Aelle had sensed their nervousness the moment he entered camp, and knew it was more than the usual anxieties before battle. It was the enormity of the threat facing them and the meagre strength they had to combat it which inspired these fears, and he regretted that he could do little to soothe them. "Does the shaman remain in her tent?" he asked the night sentry, both their beards salted with frost.

"She does. What word from our brother tribes? Will more join our cause?"

Not for the first time, Aelle cursed the name of Thane Cadwyn, spitting to avert his evil. "Some will. Others remain blind to the threat and the truth." Aelle saw the man pale, and immediately moved to reassure him. "My blood-brother Madoc will not forsake us, and we are each worth ten lesser men. I promise you, we will prevail."

"Of course, Lord Aelle. The shaman sent word; you are to come to her as soon as you returned."

Nodding in thanks, Aelle made for the shaman's tent, observing the rest of the warband with quiet pride. Thane Vladimar had sent only thirty of his warriors to aid them on this mission, but they were amongst the strongest and most disciplined of the Night Wolves, men he could trust beside him on the shieldwall, men who would fight to the Godshall and back for the Bjornfist. But if they were afraid…

It did not matter. Whatever foe they faced, whatever nature of horror lurked out there in the looming dark, they would find it, and with the favour of the Gods, they would slay it. Aelle knew this in the bone. Let Cadwyn amuse himself with petty raids, let the thanes and lords and warriors who scurried in his wake be content with their scraps of plunder and meaningless baubles. The Night Wolves fought for the Gods, and that made them stronger than all the warbands and tribes who whored themselves out to the chieftain of the Dead Foxes.

After all, weakness was not an Avvar trait. Driven from their homes during the great war against the Alamarri, the Avvar had settled in the frozen and hostile peaks of the Frostbacks rather than bend the knee to Hafter and his dog-loving kin. In time, many of the tribes migrated further to the Free Marches, taking refuge within the Vinmark Mountains and the foothills of the Palansene, reclaiming those lands lost in during the advance of Old Tevinter, wild places where they could hold the Gods close to them. Theirs was a hard life, but Aelle would have it no other way; even a greedy fool like Thane Cadwyn was worthier than the decadent lowlanders.

The Night Wolves had taken great care to establish their camp so as to avoid attention. It was an art the Avvars had long honed, and within the thickly wooded copse nestled in the Palansene Forest, their tents were concealed against the bark of the trees and the black of night. The shaman's tent had been placed in the middle, and Aelle noted the great murder of crows sitting atop the poles and branches supporting it; a good omen, a clear sign that the Lady of the Skies still favoured their cause. Not bothering to knock, the warrior brushed aside the tent flaps and entered, breathing in the heady scent of burning herbs and incense. It was warm here thanks to the shaman's ritual fire, sending drops of meltwater running through his blonde beard. As his blue eyes adjusted to the dim, he could make out various shapes; the antlers of a deer that had gored three spearmen before falling, a lock of virgin's hair, a perfect pinion feather from an eagle that had roosted on a longhouse's roof on the first day of spring, and many more besides. All were objects of worth, signs of the Gods' power, and jealously hoarded by Avvar shamans whenever they found them. Keeping his distance from the totems out of respect, Aelle approached the shaman, stilling his tongue until she had finished whatever ritual she was performing over the fire.

Minutes passed, and eventually, the shaman deigned to acknowledge his presence. "You have returned, Aelle Bjornfist ap Halwyde. How many men do you bring from our kindred?"

"None, Lilith Everseeing."

"None?" the old woman shrieked, turning to face him with milky-white eyes. On her shoulders, the two ravens mirrored her anger; the bird on her right shoulder black-feathered with unnaturally blue eyes, and on her left, an albino raven with orbs of red. Instinctively, Aelle stepped back in the face of their fury. The shaman had experienced over sixty winters and the Gods had seen fit to take her sight when she was barely a maiden bloomed, but against the might of her sorcery, he might as well be a child playing with sticks. "Not one of our brother tribes has seen fit to aid us?"

"They have not, wise one," Aelle elaborated, his baritone voice rumbling in the dark like stones in a landslide. "I met their leaders, I paid them tribute, I took mead in their halls and told them of the threat facing us all, and it was all for naught. A few declared the omens were bad, some stalled and disassembled like lowlander merchants, and a few were bold enough to laugh in my face. Many will not stir from their lands this winter. Too many others follow the banner of the Dead Foxes."

The shaman spit onto the fire. "Our lands and people are threatened by the darkness, and they seek lowlander gold? More fools they. And their shamans?"

"Many doubt you, wise one, and some have been so ensnared by Cadwyn's greed they do not acknowledge the truth. Others say that too many seasons have passed for the Prince to return, and that you have seen too many if you doubt otherwise."

"Then they shall pay for their arrogance tenfold," Lilith snarled, pitching more herbs onto the fire. "Their limbs will rot and their minds with wither, and the tongues with which they told such falsehoods will be torn from them by the Lady's servants. As for the Dead Foxes," she intoned, long-nailed fingers splaying outwards. "Their herds will sicken and their lands will spoil, and their children shall become as beasts. I shall take Cadwyn's soul as my plaything, and cast those of his warriors into the Utterdark, never to find their way." All around her, the shadows projected by the firelight danced and twisted of their own accord, and Aelle gave an involuntary shiver. The Gods may have taken her sight, but they had granted her considerable magical power in return, and if they saw fit, the curses she laid would reap their bitter fruit. The ravens croaked and called in assent.

"All is not lost, wise one. We have the thirty warriors granted to us by Thane Vladimar, and a swift messenger to him will bring reinforcements. And Madoc ap Cuneglas will bring his warriors to aid us, I know it upon my soul."

"The Thane cannot help us. He has taken the rest of the Night Wolves into the Frostbacks, for it seems our cousins to the west prepare to take up arms against the Blight. All the more reason that we resolve this quickly, so we can add our strength to theirs. And it has been two weeks since you dispatched word to your friend. If he were true, he would have sent word."

"Thane Harald is a stubborn man, but Madoc has the tongue of Wintersbreath, and his uncle cannot oppose him forever. Madoc is a fine warrior and blood-sworn to aid me in time of need. He will come."

"Let us hope he does," Lilith said, turning her back to him, "for we will need strong arms to hold back the tide. Time enough has been lost already, and the Gods have not told us our fate. The Mound yet remains hidden from my sight." An iron dagger appeared in her hand. "A show of commitment is required."

With deliberate slowness, Lilith plunged the dagger into her wrist, letting the blood ooze forth. The hairs on the back of Aelle's neck stood on end, and he felt the magic flow, the Gods responding to her sacrifice with a blessing of their power. The Avvar shamans were not like the weakling mages of the lowlands who wilted and cringed at the sight of their own blood. They knew that nothing of value came without sacrifice, and when the stakes were this high, sacrifice was truly needed.

Screeching in agony, Lilith ripped the blade free, the droplets of blood becoming suspended in mid-air by the magic. She began to chant, her voice suddenly overlaid with another, hands grasping blindly at the numerous tokens and fetishes she had arranged around her. Her voice swelled to an ominous baritone, and the two ravens shrieked skywards, drowning it out. Dumbstruck by the ritual, Aelle stayed motionless, lest he somehow disrupt it or offend the Gods with his temporal blunderings.

And then, with a final wail, Lilith collapsed, slumping towards the cold ground of the tent, only to be caught in Aelle's surprisingly gentle hands. "Are you all right, wise one?"

When she spoke, her voice was her own again, but pregnant with barely-constrained malice. "Cadwyn… The bastard has doomed us all."

The fear, that damned fear, overcame Aelle once more. "You know where the Mound lies? You have found the seat of the foe?"

"Not just that, warrior, but Cadwyn's folly as well. The Gods showed me a vision of the Mound. It lies beneath a place of stone, dead and silent, and Cadywn's forces approach it even now."

"But that means…"

"Yes, the Night Eternal. All that death, thanks to one man's stupidity! Rouse the Night Wolves, Aelle, and break camp. We may not beat him there, but we must try!" Lilith declared, fire in her eyes. "We must…"

"Wise one?"

Ignorant of the blood dribbling from her wound, Lilith opened a clenched palm, gazing upon the icon she had seized in her trance. "The Gods sent me another sign."

Lying in the flat of her palm were the talons of a hawk.

* * *

Daybreak had come to the Palansene Forest, but these first days of Wintermarch in the new year of 9:31 Dragon gave no promise of warmth, even in the relatively temperate Free Marches. The earth was iron-hard beneath the packed ice and snow, the trees skeletal and silent in the still air, and for one brief, glorious moment, the Marches were at peace.

Then that peace was broken by the thunder of hooves, the ice shattering like glass beneath them. Thirty horsemen rode hard down the Palansene road with the jangle of mail and shields, their lancepoints whetted bright under the winter sun. Each was dressed in polished chainmail or half-plate, their faces dark beneath their helms, and each bore a sword or mace alongside their seven-foot lances. They rode stallions, not the proud destriers of the world's heavy cavalry forces, but strong and reliable beasts nonetheless, the breath of the animals and their riders steaming in the cold air. These were hard men and proud, well-versed in slaughter, plunder and battle, and they rode hard to their destination beneath a banner depicting a red anvil on a field of white.

In their wake followed the infantry, cohort after cohort winding down that long, cold road, pushed hard by their officers and laden down beneath the weight of greatswords, crossbows, long spears and armour. Their iron-shod boots dragged across earth and ice as they marched in their fatigue. Meeran had insisted they reach their destination quickly, so it had been cold beef, hard tack biscuits and an endless march for the past two weeks that had begun hours before sunrise and ended hours after. News of their destination was little consolation. It mean no friendly taverns, cheap whores, foes to plunder or any of the other perks that mercenaries looked forward to, which hardly improved morale. Ahead was an icy road cutting through dark, pine-shrouded hills. Behind was much the same, albeit with distant smoke suggesting the existence of villages and human life amidst the cold.

The officers rode, of course, mounted on agile steeds at the head of the column. After all, while marching alongside one's men might be the custom in half-barbarian places like Ferelden, this was the Free Marches, and even mercenary bands had standards to keep. Amongst the hard-bitten officer cadre was an unusual sight, a young girl, no more than nineteen, her youthful beauty and innocent nature completely unlike that of the men who stared at her lustfully from the ranks. She wore a low-cut blouse that dipped low towards the swell of her breasts, while her midsection was protected with a habergeon of chainmail built into the garment and her legs encased within taut breeches and soft leather boots. A red scarf concealed the delicate curves of her neck, a suitor's gift from a year and a lifetime ago. At a sheath bound to the horse's saddle, a long staff had been placed, one side tipped with a large crimson jewel secured with branch-like grips, the other with a wicked, foot-long blade.

Shivering, she tightened her grey cloak about her body and listened to one of the outriders give his report. "The fortress is on the next ridge," the horseman said, his lower face masked with cloth to ward off the cold. "It doesn't look like anyone's there."

"Well, you better bloody well make sure that it's clear before we arrive, understand? We walk into an ambush, and it's your hide," snarled the leader of the mercenaries, a balding man in his forties, his cheeks and jaw lined with faint grey stubble and a pair of blades at his back. His attentions turned to the girl, and he gave a lascivious smile that made her skin crawl in revulsion. "Bethany, be a good girl and inform Whittaker and that sister of yours that we've nearly arrived. I want our billet set up and our supplies organized and ready within the hour, is that clear?"

"Of course, Meeran," Bethany replied, turning her horse and setting off on a gallop down the road, ignoring the whistles and obscene suggestions that filtered up from the infantry. _Just a few more months,_ she reminded herself, spurring her mount on. _A few more months, the debt will be paid, and we'll be free again._

The rear of the column had been reserved for the company's supply train, a score of screeching ox-carts trundling down the road, guarded by a final cohort of grumbling infantry and driven by cloaked handlers. Her sister was in the lead cart, as expected. Meeran had denied her a fighting role within the company, but even then, she was the sort to lead from the front whenever she could, even if her command was… unglamorous. "Are you staying warm back here?" Bethany teased.

Smiling, the lead handler pulled her hood back, revealing a handsome young woman, her astonishing blue eyes glimmering with delight at seeing her sister again. Where Bethany's black locks descended to her shoulders, Marian's were cut boyishly short, displaying the hard beauty of her face. She had always been the strongest of the Hawkes, in every way that mattered. Life had not allowed her otherwise. Too many gazed upon the young warrior and saw only her high, proud cheekbones and crimson lips and imagined her toned body beneath her armour. They rarely stopped to see the steel in her, that relentless drive to succeed that had allowed her to lead the family after Father's death, to escape the disaster at Ostagar, to try and carve out a life for them here in the Free Marches. Even in her current role, she kept the greatsword her father had given her slung at her back, as if boasting that she was meant for better things than this… and would achieve them too. "It's nothing a roaring fire and a good hot meal won't cure," she replied. "I take it that we're nearly there?"

"Yes, Meeran said that you and Whittaker need to set everything up in the hour," the apostate girl explained with a grimace. "He shouldn't order you around like that, sister, you worked harder than anyone else in the company."

"I know, Beth, I know. Just don't worry about it, okay? Tell him that we'll have everything ready, I promise."

"Alright then. I'll see you once everything's settled."

Once Bethany had ridden back to Meeran, Marian twisted her head to face the older man riding the cart behind her. "Did you hear that, Whittaker?"

"Aye, I did, lass," he grumbled, snapping the reins. "Sounds like our lord and master is eager to see his new castle."

Cresting a small hill, the column finally saw the fortress, looming upon a high ridge like an owl in the trees, waiting for its prey to walk past. It was a brute place of war, built in a time when Kirkwall feared the advance of enemies from the west, and abandoned when the danger had seemingly passed. Fort Westgarde, a place inhabited only by mice, crows and the wind for the past three decades, was to be the base for the Red Iron mercenary company to fulfill their newest contract. Time had not weakened the walls, nor brought down its towers, and the gate was shut and locked with ice and iron. Westgarde was silent, and still.

And waiting for them.

"Cheerful looking place, isn't it, Hawke?" asked Whittaker.

_Hawke._ It was a name that would echo throughout the Age, as would the titles that would come to be associated with it: the Red Knight, the Champion of Kirkwall, the Eagle of the South, the Reaving Storm, the Rout of the Heretics and the Maker's Foe. But that was the future, and for now, she was simply Marian Hawke, Fereldan refugee and assistant quartermaster to the Red Iron mercenary company, staring out over a long, cold road.

"Hawke? You alright?"

"I'm sorry, Whittaker, I was just thinking."

"Well, think and drive at the same time, we have a lot of work to do, and not a lot of time to do it."

"Right," Hawke replied, flicking the reins. If the old fortress was waiting for them, it would be rude to deny the invitation…


End file.
